Pascal's wager...

[DBT]

Seriously , Good on you sport, for finding it. ( I won't get the book now)

Sport? Not me. Maybe you? Are you a Sport? Pascals Wager itself expresses a form of Sport. A wager on a flip of a metaphorical coin on who is supposed to live or die, a sport that is presumed to represent the will of the gods.

 

[Cheerful Charlie]

Men never do evil so completely and cheerfully as when they do it from a religious conviction.
- Blaise Pascal

 

[Learner]

Seriously , Good on you sport, for finding it. ( I won't get the book now)

Sport? Not me. Maybe you? Are you a Sport? Pascals Wager itself expresses a form of Sport. A wager on a flip of a metaphorical coin on who is supposed to live or die, a sport that is presumed to represent the will of the gods.

Its that "old" pom's typecast characterization of those "down-under",assuming you're Australian. Must be old fashioned now. I first heard the use of "sport" (the aussie way ) from "Rolf Harris" when I was a little boy. (He was an Australian entertainer, to our US members) if it means something derogatory nowadays (which I don't know of) it wasn't mean't that way.

 

[DBT]

Learner, no Problem. The term 'Sport' can have several connotations. Cute when referring to little children, but offensive in some circumstances....

 

[Keith&Co.]

Well that's goofy. The premise is that reason cannot be applied to whether there are gods are not. How does one even get to that point without applying reasoning to get to that point?

That's not goofy, though. He doesn't say 'reason cannot be applied' he says that it cannot conclude.

Reason takes you to the point where you realize there isn't enough evidence available to answer the question. Like a poorly written puzzle in my Puzzle-A-Day calendar. The one where they seem to have mixed two different puzzles and gave a previous day's answer on top of that. Something like 'Which of the following colors is not found in nature?' and the options are 'One, Two, Height and Distance.' And the answer was Grover Cleveland. Reason can be applied, but cannot conclude the answer they're looking for.

Now, where he blames the atheists? If you cannot just will yourself to believe, you need to recognize that this is a problem, and do whatever you have to in order to believe.
That's the part that appeals to, how did Admiral Calavicci put it? "These are the guys that keep those fishing shows on the air."

 

[Keith&Co.]

In any case, I have one more pretty jewel than you, so I must be right.

And if you have fewer, are you wrong?
How about the same? What does the same, mean?

 

[Keith&Co.]

Here... we seem to have the context in the underlined , and the atheists kept "demanding" reasoned answers from the theists!

You're a little confused, here, Learner.
Even IFF the final answer to the question of God is not something reason can completely establish, that is not true for all the aspects of belief, the Bible, religion, and so on.
If nothing else, we can ask for reasoned answers to achieve a working hypothesis.

One guy, however smart, saying that God is not a subject where reason can determine the answer also does not stop people like Strobel from trying to reason God into existence.

The theists, using reason kept replying with; "you can't fake the belief, and you can't convert if you're not already convinced,

Huh? REASON tells you no one can be converted? But, then, whence all the atheist to faithful CONVERSION STORIES?

which means : it couldn't have been in the context they (atheists) thought it was.

I don't think you're reading this at all correctly. He literally says, if you can't just bring yourself to believe, you need to convince yourself anyway.

 

[T.G.G. Moogly]

Well that's goofy. The premise is that reason cannot be applied to whether there are gods are not. How does one even get to that point without applying reasoning to get to that point?

That's not goofy, though. He doesn't say 'reason cannot be applied' he says that it cannot conclude.

Reason takes you to the point where you realize there isn't enough evidence available to answer the question.

Actually I think the word is "decide" so any number of semantic lawyers could get into a shit squabble. And reason can certainly take one to the point of deciding and concluding that gods aren't real.

But right now I'm trying to decide whether I have a trillion dollars hidden in a secret place. I've found it difficult to conclude reasonably whether the trillion dollars is real. So I'm going to live my life like I indeed have a trillion dollars. Just makes sense to do that because if I don't I lose my trillion dollars or lose it for my heirs.

Makes sense I think.

 

[220volt]

Is there a great moral precept somewhere saying that it's against the rules for any decent "God" to care what humans believe? engraved on gold tablets? handed down "from on high"?

That makes no sense whatsoever.

If you have a "fear of being on the wrong side of the argument," doesn't that mean you think the other "side of the argument" might really be the truth? Why would you fear being "on the wrong side" unless this means you believe the other side might be the "right side" of the argument? meaning it might be the truth? meaning you believe it (fear that it's the truth), though with doubt?

Believing doesn't have to mean there's no doubt (or no fear of being wrong).

"Faking your belief out of fear of being on the wrong side of the argument" means you fear that this belief you're faking might actually be a true belief, and to hedge your bets, you "pretend" to have this belief because it might be the truth. I.e., you half-way do believe it already, as a possibility. And this doubting belief causes you to claim to believe it, in order to safeguard against being on the wrong side.

Why would the "omnipotent being" reject this kind of belief? You can call it "faking," but it's really based on a genuine belief (fear) of what might be the truth, or what you think (fear) might be the truth.

There is no reason why Christ-belief cannot be partly a belief from fear that it might be the truth. Belief can include doubting and hoping and fearing. It can include wanting it to be true, but also fearing that it might be true. There is no reason to condemn any kind of believing, calling it "fake" or whatever.

If one is trying to believe, no matter what drives it, there is nothing ungenuine about it, or phony. In the accounts of those healed by Jesus, in the Gospels, there is nothing to suggest that the "faith" of these ones healed was a very superior kind of faith which had to measure up to some high standard of loftiness.

(In any case, I have one more pretty jewel than you, so I must be right.)

But I have no fear on being on the wrong side of argument. Pascal's wager doesn't imply that. I am not on the "fence" at all, so in order for me to go to the other side (just in case I'm wrong) I have to fake my belief. Can't "make" myself believe if I'm not on the fence. Pascal's wager applies to everyone, and not just those who are on the fence, therefore it is pretty dumb argument in the first place.

 

[ideologyhunter]

This is why the Flying Spaghetti Monster is a useful metaphor (as tired as it is.) Or pick any orthodoxy and read up on it enough, and you will conclude that People Will Believe Anything.

 

[Politesse]

This is why the Flying Spaghetti Monster is a useful metaphor (as tired as it is.)

Useful? For what?

 

[ideologyhunter]

It has the same utility as Russell's teapot orbiting around the sun -- metaphors for unsubstantiated assertions of believers; for every situation in which people insist that you must give respectful attention to every deity and orthodoxy -- that agnosticism is as far as any fair and rational person can go. At that point you can say to them, well, I believe in the FSM, and also, there's a walrus living on Pluto in a protected geodome. Prove it isn't so or you must grant me the possibility that it's there.

 

[Keith&Co.]

It has the same utility as Russell's teapot orbiting around the sun -- metaphors for unsubstantiated assertions of believers; for every situation in which people insist that you must give respectful attention to every deity and orthodoxy -- that agnosticism is as far as any fair and rational person can go. At that point you can say to them, well, I believe in the FSM, and also, there's a walrus living on Pluto in a protected geodome. Prove it isn't so or you must grant me the possibility that it's there.

Or as a litmus test. If evidence offered for Deity X works equally well to prove the FSM, we have identified a problem with the evidence.

 

[lpetrich]

Or the Invisible Pink Unicorn, for that matter. From Bertrand Russell himself,

Many orthodox people speak as though it were the business of sceptics to disprove received dogmas rather than of dogmatists to prove them. This is, of course, a mistake. If I were to suggest that between the Earth and Mars there is a china teapot revolving about the sun in an elliptical orbit, nobody would be able to disprove my assertion provided I were careful to add that the teapot is too small to be revealed even by our most powerful telescopes. But if I were to go on to say that, since my assertion cannot be disproved, it is intolerable presumption on the part of human reason to doubt it, I should rightly be thought to be talking nonsense. If, however, the existence of such a teapot were affirmed in ancient books, taught as the sacred truth every Sunday, and instilled into the minds of children at school, hesitation to believe in its existence would become a mark of eccentricity and entitle the doubter to the attentions of the psychiatrist in an enlightened age or of the Inquisitor in an earlier time.

He also stated

I ought to call myself an agnostic; but, for all practical purposes, I am an atheist. I do not think the existence of the Christian God any more probable than the existence of the Gods of Olympus or Valhalla. To take another illustration: nobody can prove that there is not between the Earth and Mars a china teapot revolving in an elliptical orbit, but nobody thinks this sufficiently likely to be taken into account in practice. I think the Christian God just as unlikely.

Thus being a weak atheist.

 

[Cheerful Charlie]

It has the same utility as Russell's teapot orbiting around the sun -- metaphors for unsubstantiated assertions of believers; for every situation in which people insist that you must give respectful attention to every deity and orthodoxy -- that agnosticism is as far as any fair and rational person can go. At that point you can say to them, well, I believe in the FSM, and also, there's a walrus living on Pluto in a protected geodome. Prove it isn't so or you must grant me the possibility that it's there.

Or as a litmus test. If evidence offered for Deity X works equally well to prove the FSM, we have identified a problem with the evidence.

Known as "The Great Pumpkin" problem. A problem that became notorious with the efforts of Alvin Plantinga. How to offer some sort of evidence for God that creates room for God but excludes things like Linus's Great Pumpkin theology. Lacking really good evidence, theists must lower the bar for evidence for God, but have to exclude Great Pumpkins or Flying Spaghetti Monsters. Which leads to The Son Of The Great Pumpkin problem. What are the epidemiological foundations and principles for proving God exists? Which theologians and theist philosophers can't seem to demonstrate such things exist that can in principle demonstrate God exists while excluding Great Pumpkins.

Tis a bitch.

 

[Wiploc]

Or the Invisible Pink Unicorn, for that matter. From Bertrand Russell himself,


He also stated

I ought to call myself an agnostic; but, for all practical purposes, I am an atheist. I do not think the existence of the Christian God any more probable than the existence of the Gods of Olympus or Valhalla. To take another illustration: nobody can prove that there is not between the Earth and Mars a china teapot revolving in an elliptical orbit, but nobody thinks this sufficiently likely to be taken into account in practice. I think the Christian God just as unlikely.

Thus being a weak atheist.

Why wouldn't he be a strong atheist? You don't think he had an opinion about whether that teapot exists?

 

[Keith&Co.]

Why wouldn't he be a strong atheist? You don't think he had an opinion about whether that teapot exists?

but that opinion doesn't compare, because no one ELSE was suggesting it existed.

A strong OR weak atheist would agree that gods and teapots they themselves invented do not exist.

 

[Wiploc]

Why wouldn't he be a strong atheist? You don't think he had an opinion about whether that teapot exists?

but that opinion doesn't compare, because no one ELSE was suggesting it existed.

A strong OR weak atheist would agree that gods and teapots they themselves invented do not exist.

Are you in doubt about the teapot because you didn't invent it yourself?

A. Teapotists believe the teapot does exist.
B. Stong ateapotists believe the teapot does not exist.
C. Weak ateapotists don't believe either way.

To be a weak ateapotist, he'd have had to not believe either way. That doesn't seem plausible.

 

[James Brown]

I see it differently.

A Strong ateapotist says 'There is no teapot.'

A Weak ateapotist says 'I don't believe there is a teapot.'

An agnostic says, 'I don't know if there is a teapot.'

 

[Keith&Co.]

When i think of the word 'god' my mind goes to christain tradition, jewish, islamic AND gods invented by scifi/fantasy writers, and gods invented for games. The actual image that my mind offers first is the AD&D book Deity & Demigods.

But if asked to assess how likely or even possible it is that any given deity exists outside of the minds of followers, Garl Glittergold and Arioch are dismissed quite a bit faster and easier than Thor or Inanna.

To the point i don't even consider myself an, for example, A-Glittergoldist. If i ever meet a gnome who claims to be a firm Glittergoldist, that might change.
But if i meet a human who is a firm Glittergoldist, i am going to keep my hands in my pockets. No loud noises, no sudden movements. Eyes on any available exits, back to the wall. Because that's not just a difference of opinion, but clear whackadoodle.